gagement with the pope to take the crofs, whenever he thought it expedient, in order to expiate the murder of Thomas à Becket; and we fhall hereafter fee, that, though this treaty was not executed by thefe princes, yet it was not altogether without its effect. As the peace of the kingdom, as well as the continuance of the royal line, depended on the life of the young prince Philip, it is not at all ftrange, that the king fhould be extremely alarmed at an accident which brought him to the very brink of the grave. He was but just able to ride, when his horfe ran away with him in the wood of Compeigne, in which he continued all night, and returned in the morning, fo extremely frighted, that he fell into a grievous fit of fick nefs. This induced the king his father, according to the mode of thofe times, to refolve on a pilgrimage to the fhrine of St. Thomas, that is, the tomb of Thomas à Becket at Canterbury. He was received there with great pomp by king Henry, made his offering, and returned back in the fpace of a week; but whether the fatigue of the journey, or the agitation of his mind was the caufe, fo it fell out, that he was ftruck with an apoplexy ber. On this occafion, the young king Henry of England affifted, as duke of Normandy, and Philip, count of Flanders, carried the fword of ftate. At this time alfo the right of the archbishop of Rheims to perform the ceremony of the coronation was confirmed. Soon after the marriage of the young king Philip, with the niece of the count of Flanders, who now governed all, was fettled; and the king, having languished about a year under this grievous malady, breathed his laft on the 18th of September, in the fixtieth year of his age, and in the 1180. forty-fourth of his reign, being efteemed a pious and chafte prince; but as the English, as well as the French, hiftorians observe, lefs a politician than was requifite for the conjun&ture in which he lived. [To be continued.] Account of fome Specimens of the Poetry of the ancient Welsh Bards, tranflated into English by the Rev. Mr. Evan Evans. Welsh, and as fuch had been induced to think that a tranflation of fome of them would be no unacceptable prefent to the public, which, he fays, was firft thought of and encouraged fome years before the name of Offian was known in England. Thus much for the motives of his undertaking. With regard to the execution, the Rev. Editor very modeftly tells us, that these poems in the original have great merit, and if there is none in the translation, it must be owing to his inability to do them juftice. There was alfo another difficulty he laboured under, but which Mr. Macpherfon, if his collection be genuine, did not, viz. that the oldest poets in the Erfe language are still, it feems, perfectly intelligible; whereas thofe of the Welsh bards, who writ even a confiderable time after Offian, are hardly understood by the best critics and antiquarians in Wales. What this difference is owing to, as their language has not undergone more changes than the Erfe, he leaves to others to determine ; but it seems to furnish an oblique argument against the authenticity of Offian's poems, which thofe who difpute the genuinenefs of them, will doubtlefs be glad to lay hold of. This is alfo the reafon that in the collection before us we find but one piece of the cele brated Taliefin's, that too not the beft, but the only one that is thoroughly understood; and none of the famous Lewarch Hên's. The reft are taken from different bards who wrote fome hundreds of years after. In fuch a great variety it is impoffible to give a specimen of all. We shall therefore content ourselves with the following extract from the first poem in the book, compofed by Owain Cyveiliog, prince of Powys, who flourished about the year 1160, on account of a battle fought with the English at Maelor, in the counties of Denbigh and Flint. "When the dawn arofe, the fhout was given; the enemy gave an ominous prefage; our men were ftained with blood, after a hard conteft; and the borders of Maelor Drefred were beheld with wonder and astonishment. "O cup-bearer, who, with patience, mindeft thy duty, forfake us not; fetch the horn, that we may drink together, whofe glofs is like the wave of the fea, whofe green handles fhew the skill of the artist, and are tipped with gold. Bring the beft meath, and put it in Gwgan Draws's hand, for the noble feats he hath atchieved: the offspring of Gronwy, who valiantly fought in the midst of dangers; a race of heroes for worthy acts renowned; and men, who, in every hardship they undergo, deferve a reward; who are in the battle foremost: the guardians of Sabrina. Their friends exult when they hear their voice. The fetal fhout will ceafe when they are gone. "Fill thou the yellow-tipped horn, badge of honour and mirth, full of frothing meath, and if thou art defirous to have thy life prolonged to the year's end, ftop not the reward due to his virtue, for it is unjuft; and bring it to Griffith, with the crimfon lance. Bring wine in the transparent horn; for he is the guardian of Arwiftli, the defence of its borders; a dragon of Owain the generous, whofe defcent is from Cynvyn; a dragon he was from the beginning, that never was terrified in the battle; his brave actions shall follow him. Fill thou the horn; for it is my Talietin flourished about the year 560, long after Offian. delight, in the place where the defenders of our country drink mead, and give it to Selyf the fearless, the defence of Gwygyr; woe to the wretch that offends him, eaglehearted hero; and to the fon of Madoc, the famous and generous Tudur, like a wolf when he feizes his prey, is his affault in the onfet. Two heroes, who were fage in their counfels, but active in the field, two fons of Ynyr, who, on the day of battle were ready for the attack, keedlefs of danger, famous for their exploits; their affault was like that of strong lions, and they pierced their enemies like brave warriors, they were lords of the battle, and rushed foremost with their crimson lances; the weight of their attack was not to be withstood; their fhields were broke afunder with much force, as the high-founding wind on the beach of the green fea, and the encroaching of the furious waves on the coaft of Talgarth. "Fill, cup bearer, as thou re gardeft thy life; fill the horn, badge of honour at feafts, the hirlas drinking-horn, which is a token of dif tinction, whofe tip is adorned with filver, and its cover of the fame metal; and bring it to Tudur, the eagle of battles, filled with the best wine; and if thou dost not bring us the beft of all, thy head fhall fly off :) give it in the hand of Moreiddig, encourager of fongs, whofe praife in battle is celebrated; they were brethren of a diftant clime, of an undaunted heart, and their valour was obfervable in their countenance. Can I forget their fervices? .... Impetuous warriors, wolves of the battle, their lances are befineared with gore; they were the heroes of the chief of Mochnant, in the reigon of Powys. Their honour was foon purchased by them both; they seized every occafion to defend their country, in the time of need, with their bloody arms, and they kept their borders from hoftile invafion." Some Account of A New Syftem of Philofophy, by James Usher. TH HE intention of this writer, who founds his philofophy on the univerfal operations of nature, is to overthrow the long-received fyftem of mechanic philofophy, which, by fuppofing every thing to be the "Effects of the undirected concourfe of particles of various shapes, fizes, and motions," does not, in his opinion, "afford a fufficient caufe, or explication of the grandeur, the beauty, the order, and defign of the vifible creation."-We have not room to enter into a minute difcuffion of fo abftrufe a fubject, but hall here lay before the reader a part of our author's obfervations, which are as follow: "It is the prevailing opinion, that all material bodies that grow, muft neceffarily perish, and fuffer wreck by the hand of time; and that the only means of preserving youth and immortality to material beings, must be by miracle. This, like other trite opinions in general, arofe from the prefent profpect which appears to the mind, and is true only with regard to our actual fituation; for did the different elements, of which the infant body is compofed, attract only fimilar elements; or were the attractions of the conftituent parts reciprocal and equal, fo as to limit and fully employ each other's energy, and in mutual embraces to fleep in apathy and indifference to external corpufcles, I do not comprehend how fuch bodies could foffer decay or death. "The fire annihilates nothing: what is confumed thereby afcends leifurely above the precincts of the flame in a thick cloud of fmoak, and apparently mingles with the Ether. If in their paffage, the afcending invisible particles meet with any body to which they may adhere, they gather upon it in fcft layers of foot, with which you may once more feed the flames. The tallow and wax of candles, in their recefs not only affect your fmell, you may catch them over the flame on any fubftance, to which oily particles are apt to ad here. "There is no reason then to fuppofe any the leaft corpufcle to be loft, altered, or annihilated by the fire; its effects are only to diffolve the crafts or union of the body. Every element, and every particle of matter, remain unalterable, and for ever the fame. Nor is there room to judge that fire intimately pervades the fimple elements of matter, but only by its fluid activity, infinuates into the interftices, as water does into a fpunge. A ball of iron red hot is not a ball of fire, but a ball of iron perforated, and glowing with fire. When the fire has feparated all the minima naturalia in bodies, and thus become continuous, and thofe minima naturalia are not volatile, as in metals, then they fwim in the fluid fire, as falt does in water, and the fuperficies or bulk of the metal is confiderably encreafed. When the fire is afterwards exhaled, then the particles of the metal lie clofe and compact on each other, and the mafs becomes rigid. "It hath been obferved juftly, that men are often right in their practice in oppofition to theory. While philofophers and fcholars amufed the world with a catholic matter, which formed bodies of different kinds, according to the shapes and fizes of its wandering particles that cohered into fenfible matles: and while chemifts, on the credit of the fages of learning and knowledge, were wafting their health and fortunes, endeavouring to hit on the texture and conftitution that forms gold and the elixir of life, out of this catholic matter; farmers, tradesmen and mechanics, bleffed with plain common fenfe, and the want of learning, went on just as if the fpecies of nature were permanent and unchangeable; they fowed cora, acorns, flax and hemp, and put out their fons to trades upon the expectancy that nature produces in kind, and that the next violent thuffle of corpufcles, or a windy March, would not by new evolutions and concuffions, produce bodies of a confufed kind, different from what tradefmen are skilled in. Such a prodigious and refined philofopher as Mr. Locke might contemplate his abftra&t and nominal effences. Tradefmen and peafants deal only in the real things which they handle and poffefs. They have no fort of acquaintance with abstract effences; and kind nature, from the days of Adam to this, has favoured them with fimilar productions; so as to enable them to make provisions, at a long distance of time, and to be certain of the kind of crop, while nothing nothing yet appears but a green blade, or even before a green blade yet fprouts forth." In a note he hath the following familiar illuftration :-" Since learning and fyftem have fo far vanquithid common sense, as to make men deny the fpecific formations of nature, which women and children know, and of which birds and beafts, who cannot abstract, confefs their fenfe in the most intelligible language imaginable, in their pursuits, their averfions, and their loves; and ince those who deny the fpecific productions of nature, in vindication of their fyftem, produce the variations found by chemifts in their analysis of the fame fpecies, as a proof that mature doth not work regularly on the fame plan; I am obliged to point out the caufe of the variations in queftion, and fhew that they in reality may depend on fpecific or parallel natural productions: but first, that heedlefs people may not be impofed upon, by an equivoque in the objection, let it be obferved, that, by the word Variation, or any equivalent thereto, is not meant that the onions of this year, are refolvable into the fame chemical elements with the turnips of last year; or that the onions of this year are found to want the principles into which they were refolvable two hundred years ago; or have changed, like the fafhion in wooden furniture, from oak to walnut, and from walnut to mahogany; the variation fpoken of in the objection is not of this kind, but fomething very dif ferent, of which I am just going to fpeak. "Any person who compares the wines of a hot, dry feafon, with the wines of a moist cool season ; or the fruits, the vegetables, and drugs that are produced in different foils and climates, will perceive, by the fenfes, the variation which gives foundation to the objection: now can we suppofe that the vine, whofe fruit differs in the different feafons, is not the fame identical Being, and governed by the fame general laws, each of thefe two feafons? Certainly, no; it is obvious then, fince the fame identical stock in different circumftances, produceth the variation objected, the specific productions of nature may alfo, in the fame different circumftances, be supposed to vary proportionably, though they have been planned by nature rigidly on the fame model, and fubjected to the fame laws." Extracts from the Hiftory of St. KILDA, by the Rev. Mr. Kenneth Macaulay. T HE idland of St. Kilda may be ranked among the greatest curiofities of the British empire. The fituation of the place, the genius of its inhabitants, their manners and customs, the constitution of their little commonwealth, that amazing dexterity with which they manage the most important branches of their bulinefs, that unexampled courage, with which they encounter dangers infurmountable to any other race of men, and that perhaps happy ignɔrance, which renders them abfolute ftrangers to thofe extravagant defires and endless purtuits, which keep the great and active world in a conftant agitation; all thefe, and fome other extraordinary circumftances, taken together at one view, feem |